Political activities contributed to surge in Ghana’s coronavirus cases – Dr Yankson contradicts Oppong Nkrumah

Dr Justice Yankson, the General Secretary of the Ghana Medical Association has rebuffed the government’s claim that political parties cannot be blamed for the surge in coronavirus cases.

Information Minister, Kojo Oppong Nkrumah has in several interviews justified that no data exists to support the assertions that the political activities contributed to the rise in cases.

Oppong Nkrumah sought to attribute the worsening state of Ghana’s coronavirus battle to disregard for the protocols during the yuletide.

“if you take the election period, I am sure the doctors will tell you that the data will not support the argument. I know it is fanciful for us to make that argument. But the election period was on December 7 and we are looking at 14 days around that period but we didn’t see that [increase in Covid-19 cases].

"But during the yuletide, that is, from December 25 to the New Year era, you will notice [people disregarded the protocols].”

But in an interview with Citi TV, Dr Yankson said that the political leaders failed to show leadership during their rallies by ensuring that the protocols were obeyed.

He intimated that it is an established fact that the activities held prior to the elections played a significant role in the numbers being recorded recently.

“We know political actors who had COVID-19 so when we are discussing this, we should not make it seem like it was just these last two days that we had over 58,000 cases. The truth is that the political activities contributed to the numbers, so nobody should try and dissociate our case count from the political activities.”

“During these political activities, both leaders of the opposition and majority including independent candidates did not demonstrate enough leadership and their members felt the disease is of no importance now,” Dr Yankson intimated.

Ghana currently has an active case count 1,924 and 352 deaths.